Borderland memories in comparative perspective: a collaborative workshop
DisTerrMem project coordinator Sophie Whiting reflects on a full-day event that brought together DisTerrMem researchers and a group of civil society stakeholders, to share perspectives on the project’s ongoing development and ensure direct relevance of research findings to current practice. Includes video presentations from the event.
In October 2019, DisTerrMem researchers from the project’s six partner organisations travelled to Poland to spend a day, hosted by the University of Warsaw, in conversation with a group of civil society stakeholders. The event was interactively live-streamed to colleagues and collaborators internationally, hence those unable to attend in person were still able to be present on the day.
This was the first of the project’s two planned stakeholder workshops (the second will be held in Brussels in December 2020). The aim of these two events is to bring together DisTerrMem researchers and a range of practitioners and organisations involved in issues concerning dissonant heritage and memories of disputed territories, to discuss the aims of the project and to seek input from those working in relevant fields about the development of the project as a whole, in terms of achieving findings that will be of direct value to them in their work.
The workshop was opened by Anna Bull of the University of Bath, who set out the theoretical foundations of agonistic memory and how this informs the DisTerrMem project. Working across a range of case studies and political contexts, this discussion explored the potential of agonism beyond liberal democracies, including post-conflict societies. In cases of reconciliation and transitional justice we have seen how efforts to forget the past fail to provide long-term solutions, as the revival of such difficult memories is inevitable. A contemporary example of this is the ‘pact of forgetting’ following Franco’s dictatorship in Spain.
Here, Anna Bull sets out strategies for transforming antagonism to agonism and explores the potential for incorporating contrasting narratives and viewpoints in efforts to disrupt binary representations between ‘us versus them’, and for providing space for open-ended dialogue that does not aim to impose an overarching narrative.
Anna Cento Bull: Agonistic Memory & Post-Conflict Societies
Anna’s presentation was followed by input from three stakeholder discussants: Juliane Tomann, Umber Bin Ibad and Ruzanna Tsaturyan, who continued to explore the potential for agonistic memory practices across DisTerrMem’s three case study regions - Poland, Pakistan and Armenia, .
Dr Juliane Tomann
Umber Bin Ibad
Ruzanna Tsaturyan
The second half of the workshop focused on hearing the perspectives of a range of practitioners working in the fields of memory, culture and peace building. These discussions explored a diverse range of programmes and initiatives dealing with contentious pasts, yet all drew on common themes concerning the importance of education, space and silences.
Karolina Dzielak (European Network for Remembrance and Solidarity) shared her experience of working with In Between, an education project focusing on oral history research and photography across European borderlands.
Through the context of Polish and Lithuanian relations Donatas Puslys (Institute for Policy Analysis, Vilnius), discussed the potential for dialogue on sensitive historical topics and the importance of shedding light on ‘silences’ from the past.
Arpine Kostanyan (Education and Cultural Bridges) described the work carried out by the NGO sector in Armenia through international collaboration, particularly focusing on educational programmes with young people.
Dealing with Borderlands’ Contentious Pasts: Arpine Kostanyan, Karolina Dziełak & Donatas Puslys
Among those who could not join us in person but did so virtually was Krzystof Czyzewski, co-founder of Borderland Foundation. Krzystof explored the potential of cultural practices and intercultural dialogue, while Maqsood Saqib, a Punjabi writer, publisher and editor, spoke about the power of language and the legacy of partition between India and Pakistan.
From a different perspective, Patrycja Pendrakowska and Krzysztof Zalewski (Boym Institute), set out how their work as a think tank, which focuses on the economy and innovation, is inevitably shaped by the memory and the politics of remembrance and the importance of this to understanding wider social tensions in the contexts which they work.
Dr Krzysztof Czyzewski
The workshop was rounded off with an ‘advice round’ where the invited stakeholders were asked to provide guidance on how they felt the DisTerrMem project could develop in a way that would be of direct benefit to practitioners in their own work. A number of recommendations were shared, including: the creation and sharing of an academic framework that can provide a ‘toolkit’ for practitioners working in the context of memory and disputed territories; some guidelines for practice in the private sector; and a selection of educational resources that can provide teaching aids for young people to learn about conflict and disputes across borders.
Our sincere thanks to everyone who participated in the workshop and shared their ideas. And a special thank you to everyone at FINA who helped make the ‘tech’ required for the live-streaming and recording of the event so straightforward!
We hope this to be the first of many collaborative events and projects… so do keep watching this space. If you are a researcher, practitioner, policymaker - or just interested in knowing more about DisTerrMem, please get in touch with project co-ordinator Sophie Whiting (S.Whiting@bath.ac.uk) for information on how you can keep up-to-date with our events and activities.
Dr Sophie Whiting is a Senior Lecturer in the University of Bath’s Department of Politics, Languages and International Studies. Her research centres on political parties and power sharing institutions following violent conflict and the influence of ‘spoiler’ groups within peace processes. She is DisTerrMem’s project coordinator. Discover more at www.disterrmem.eu/team